You can bet every bad-actor commercial property owner in Buffalo is closely following Archer Daniels Midland's (ADM) attempt to use the emergency demolition powers of the Commissioner of Permits and Inspections to ram through, under the cloak of public safety, demolition of the landmark Great Northern  elevator. If the ADM action succeeds, it will be a blueprint for every other bad actor in town. Campaigns for emergency demolition— orders which should either not be considered at all (in place of ordering repairs) or should go through the normal Preservation Board review of public hearings, document preparation according to city standards, and possible site visits by experts—will be normalized.

To be sure, many negligent owners have pleaded in Housing Court for non-emergency demolition orders as a way to address egregious building-code violations, but requesting an emergency demolition order as a business model is a dangerous precedent for public accountability and invites corruption. ADM, according to Permits & Inspections commissioner James Comerford, approached him in 2020 about granting it and emergency demolition order, presumably after sharing much of the dubious evidence the company submitted for the present emergency demo order.

The ADM action has all the hallmarks of a legal strategy long in the making; the recent windstorm that contributed to the toppling of the north wall of was a godsend for ADM.

That is one of the reasons Paul McDonnell, president of The Campaign for Greater Buffalo, urged Mayor Byron Brown to rescind the Order of Condemnation (the emergency demolition order) in a letter hand-delivered to City Hall today. McDonnell also explained why the engineering submissions provided by ADM— more short expressions of opinion than substantiated conditions reports—are not reliable foundations for decisions on emergency demolition. McDonnell also provided drawings and photographs to demonstrate the robust design and construction of the Great Northern that were easily available to Comerford but were not consulted by him.

The Campaign is seeking a preliminary injunction against the Great Northern demolition from the Appellate Division 4th Part of State Court pending a hearing.

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Abandonment and lack of maintenance since 1982 caused the weakening at the top of the north wall, where deteriorated and missing flashing designed to protect against water infiltration was never fixed. Bushes were growing on top of the wall in 2018. Only the backing strips of the flashing were left after the brick cladding below gave way in a windstorm on December 11. Illustration included in Campaign for Greater Buffalo letter to Mayor Byron Brown.